Fixed Income
Ukraine’s sovereign Eurobonds were little-changed last week, as investors examined the IMF’s finally-published report on the second review of its cooperation program with Kyiv. The Washington-based lender gave a number of recommendations for the country’s further reform, with agricultural land liberalization prominently mentioned. Parliament has repeatedly rejected this reform for the last 15 years in an alliance between populist parties and big agricultural companies, and last week, it extended the current land sale moratorium by another year, until 2018. Geopolitical headlines were largely positive, with US Secretary of State John Kerry reiterating in a Brussels speech that the US is firmly committing to backing Ukraine amid signs that the Obama administration will be taking a tougher line against Russia during its final months in power. The shortest outstanding sovereign issue, Ukraine-2019s, inched up 0.1% to 99.1/99.7 (8.1%/7.9%) and the 10-year benchmark, Ukraine-26s, was unchang
